Kelly Monaco

When former <I>Playboy</i> model and soap siren Kelly Monaco "shook what her mamma gave her" on the dance floor of TV's summer hit "Dancing with the Stars," she went from respectable but m...
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Prince Albert of Monaco making bobsledding film

By:
WENN.com
Feb 09, 2015

Grace Kelly's son Prince Albert is preparing to enter the world of film with a biopic about his own attempts to create Monaco's first bobsledding team. Royal Ice will detail the prince's trials and tribulations as he ignored his father's advice to abandon plans to put together the sports group in the mid-1980s.
The movie will be based on a script the European royal and former Olympian co-wrote with original bobsled team member Mark Thomas.
Production representative Sergei Bespalov says, "This is the first Royal fairy tale which is a true story of a sitting Monarch, where the human drive for achievement becomes a battle with one’s own limits, amplified by the constraints of Royal duties."
In his own statement, Prince Albert II adds, "It's a very unique and personal story."
Casting details have yet to be announced, but production is expected to begin later this year (15).
Prince Albert competed in the bobsleigh events at five consecutive Winter Olympics for Monaco during his youth.

Filmmaker Julien Temple has late movie icon-turned-royal Grace Kelly to thank for the success of his Sex Pistols movie The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle, because the film came together after she urged Twentieth Century Fox executives to hand back the footage to the director and let him release it elsewhere. Temple tells Vice.com he picked up the film after Ken Loach, Stephen Frears and Russ Meyer had been attached to a Pistols project, but it only became a proper movie when bosses at Fox abandoned the idea of releasing it.
The director explains, "Russ Meyer did it (film) while I was his assistant, and then that all fell apart. Princess Grace of Monaco refused to let Twentieth Century Fox, of which she was on the board, make that film, so we were left with the film I'd shot over time and bits of stuff from television and so on.
"We made this kind of Godardian, 10-lessons-in-how-to-swindle-your-way-to-the-top-of-the-music-industry-type film. Me and (late Sex Pistols manager) Malcolm (McLaren) wrote and made it together."
The cult classic was finally released by Virgin Films in 1980.

British actor Richard Pasco has died, aged 88. The stage and screen star passed away on 12 November (14) in Warwickshire, England. No more details were available as WENN went to press.
He was best known for his theatre work, appearing in London's West End and spending more than a decade with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Over the years he shared the stage with stars including Laurence Olivier, Dame Eileen Atkins and even Grace Kelly at a poetry recital in Scotland which marked one of her rare public performances after her marriage to Prince Rainier of Monaco.
Pasco also made appearances in films such as Mrs. Brown with Dame Judi Dench, and British TV shows including Inspector Morse and Kavanagh QC, as well a number of pictures for the iconic Hammer Horror studio in the 1960s.
He also appeared with James Bond legend Sir Sean Connery in 1960 BBC drama Colombe, which featured a kiss between the pair that is believed to be the first televised man-on-man smooch.

Flamboyant Spanish aristocrat the Duchess Of Alba has died, aged 88. Cayetana Fitz-James Stuart, the 18th Duchess of Alba, passed away on Thursday (20Nov14) after battling a bout of pneumonia at a hospital in Seville, Spain.
She was descended from royalty and became a high-profile figure in Spain and a leading socialite, entertaining guests including America's former First Lady Jackie Kennedy and Grace Kelly, Princess of Monaco, over the years.
The Duchess also claimed a place in the Guinness World Records book as the most-titled noble in the world, boasting more than 40.

The royal grandson of actress-turned-princess Grace Kelly is set to become a father for the second time. Andrea Casiraghi, the son of Monaco's Princess Caroline, and his wife Tatiana Santo Domingo are expecting a second child, according to Hello! magazine.
The couple, both 30, married last year (13) and have a 19-month old boy nicknamed Sasha.
They are not the only Monaco royals who are expecting - Princess Caroline's brother Prince Albert is preparing to welcome twins with his wife, Princess Charlene.

Nicole Kidman is hoping for a career-boosting double turn on the London stage following her flop Grace Kelly biopic. The Oscar winner's reputation took a hit earlier this year (14) when her turn as the actress-turned-princess in Grace of Monaco debuted to scathing reviews and poor box office sales.
The Australian star tried to distance herself from the film failure, insisting she had "no control" over how the movie was edited and produced, and now she's hoping to return to the West End, where she wowed audiences in The Blue Room in 1998.
According to Britain's Daily Mail, Kidman is lining up two plays which will run back-to-back.
She tells the publication, "I don't know how it's going to work yet, but yes, that's the idea. Two in a row... Everything is being done to make the plays happen. There's commitment from me and everyone involved."
One of the productions the Moulin Rouge star is in negotiations over is A Month In The Country, a comedy by Ivan Turgenev.

Nicole Kidman is adamant she is not "responsible" for the critical failure of her new movie Grace Of Monaco, insisting she did not have "any control" over how the film turned out.
The Oscar winner plays actress-turned-princess Grace Kelly in the biopic, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in France earlier this month (May14) to scathing reviews. Critics branded the movie "dull" and "stiff", and it was also slammed by members of the Monaco royal family, who were unhappy with the portrayal of their mother.
However, Kidman insists the film's failure to impress is not her fault, telling Britain's Seven magazine, "As much as people go, 'Oh, the actor is totally responsible', the actor doesn't go into the editing room. I wasn't producing the film. I wasn't directing it and I don't have control over any of it. You literally do the performance and then you leave and you are told, 'Okay, come here to help promote the movie'. That's what I did."

Prospero Pictures/eOne Entertainment
It's the beginning of the summer, which means it's time for Hollywood's biggest and brightest stars to make their way to the French Riviera for the Cannes Film Festival, while the rest of us look on with jealousy. But just because you didn't snag a ticket to the most glamorous film event of the year, that doesn't mean you can't keep up with all of the big films premiering over the next two weeks. To help you stay on top of things, we're running down the biggest films that premiered in competition at the festival, including the latest from David Cronenberg, Steve Carell's potential Oscar vehicle and the high-profile movie that opened to worse reviews than Grace of Monaco.
Lost RiverActor Ryan Gosling's dreamy and feverish directorial debut follows Billy (Christina Hendricks) and her son Bones (Ian De Caestecker) as they struggle to survive the economically devastated Detroit-like city of Lost River. Billy goes to desperate lengths to keep her childhood home while Bones resorts to scavenging from local abandoned houses, but a local madman named Bully (Matt Smith) has claimed the entire neighborhood for himself. Lost River screened in the Un Certain Regard category at Cannes and was met with mostly boos from the audience. Many critics have cited Gosling's ambition, but have accused the first time director of being derivative of other, more seasoned filmmakers.
“'Lost' is indeed the operative word for this violent fairy tale about a fractured family trying to survive among the ruins of a city overrun by thugs, sexual predators and other demons, nearly all of them cribbed from the surreal cinematic imaginations of other, vastly more intuitive filmmakers. It’s perversely admirable to the extent that Gosling has certainly put himself out there, sans shame or apology, but train-wreck fascination will go only so far to turn this misguided passion project into an item of even remote commercial interest." - Justin Chang, Variety
"The visuals are undeniably dreamy, but they mostly seem borrowed from other filmmakers’ dreams. There’s a Twin Peaks feel of an alternate, off-kilter world to the whole thing, one in which arbitrary, quasi-surrealistic images barge in, sometimes for symbolic reasons, at other times arbitrarily. Many of them relate to ruin and decay—civic, environmental, bodily—and there is a sense of the ghosts who occupy both the ruined homes and the underwater town. As beautifully presented as the imagery is, however, none of it registers deeply because it all seems like borrowed goods. It’s flashy enough to engage the eye, but the experience is akin to flipping through a gorgeous art photography book featuring an assortment of artists rather than one. " - Todd McCarthy, The Hollywood Reporter
Maps to the Stars David Cronenberg’s latest film follows Agatha (Mia Wasikowska), a young woman who was disfigured in a fire, and moves to LA in an attempt to reconnect with her family… even if they don’t want to reconnect with her. Along the way she befriends a limo driver (Robert Pattinson) and gets a job working for a washed-up movie star Havana Segrand (Julianne Moore), who is attempting to land the lead role in a remake of a film that once starred her mother (Sarah Gadon). Meanwhile, Havana's shrink (John Cusack) is raising tween megastar Benjie Weiss (Evan Bird), who at 13 is fresh out of rehab and whose fame allows him to get away with just about anything.
“If Sunset Boulevard, All About Eve and Kenneth Anger's Hollywood Babylon took a bunch of prescription medication, had a two-day three-way and conceived a child, nine months later the child would look something like "Map To The Stars. […] Hollywood's seemed pretty rotten from the off in the film, but as Cronenberg exposes its stinking maggoty core of ghosts, sexual deviancy and cover-ups, the film takes on a nightmarish K-hole tone of its own, while remaining darkly, bitterly funny to the last. LA's rarely seemed as unappealing on screen, which is quite the feat.” – Oliver Lyttelton, The Playlist
“David Cronenberg's new film here at Cannes is a gripping and exquisitely horrible movie about contemporary Hollywood – positively vivisectional in its sadism and scorn. It is twisted, twisty, and very far from all the predictable outsider platitudes about celebrity culture. The status-anxiety, fame-vertigo, sexual satiety and that all-encompassing fear of failure which poisons every triumph are displayed here with an icy new connoisseurship, a kind of extremism which faces down the traditional objection that films like this are secretly infatuated with their subject.” – Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
Foxcatcher Based on the true story of the murder of wrestler Dave Schultz, Foxcatcher has emerged from the festival as a major player in next year's Oscars race. Channing Tatum stars as Mark Schultz, an Olympic wrestler who has long lived in the shadow of his older brother, Dave (Mark Ruffalo). When Mark gets an invitation from multimillionaire John E. duPont (Steve Carell) to move into his home and train at his facilities, his relationship with his new benefactor turns out ot have dangerous consequences.
"Despite its hefty 134-minute running time, “Foxcatcher” doesn’t have an ounce of the proverbial narrative fat [...] Crucially, this meticulously researched picture feels as authentic in its understanding of character as it does in its unvarnished re-creation of the world of Olympic sports in the late ’80s; rarely onscreen has the art of wrestling, centered around the violent yet intimate spectacle of men’s bodies in furious collision, provided so transfixing a metaphor for the emotional undercurrents raging beneath the surface." - Justin Chang, Variety
"Centered on an astonishing and utterly unexpected serious turn by Steve Carell, this beautifully modulated work has a great deal on its mind about America's privileged class, usurious relationships, men's ways of proving themselves, brotherly bonds and how deeply sublimated urges can assert themselves in the most unsavory ways." - Todd McCarthy, The Hollywood Reporter
Saint LaurentFocused on the life and career of Yves Saint Laurent (Gaspard Ulliel), the film charts the designer's rise to fame and his relationship with his lover and business partner, Pierre Berge (Jeremie Renier). Written and directed by Bertrand Bonello, it's one of several high-profile biopics in contention at Cannes this year, although similarities to another recent Saint Laurent movie may have been its downfall with critics, as it only earned mixed reviews.
"The point could be to show what it all cost Saint Laurent - and yet it doesn't actually seem to have cost him that much: he grows to a pampered old age, not very conspicuously interested in anyone or anything but his dog. Perhaps it is that they are entirely without affect, like a tableau by Warhol, who writes Saint Laurent a fan letter here. Finally, Saint Laurent is a well made but bafflingly airless and claustrophobic film, like being with fashion's very own Tutenkhamen , living and dying inside his own richly appointed tomb - and sentimentally indulged to the last." - Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
Perhaps through time this hallucinatory quasi-dream of a biopic will grow in stature, but as first impressions go, the film loves itself so much it renders itself beautiful, but utterly shallow. The messy structure, which includes further time jumps in the future – a random introduction of an older Saint Laurent, the Pierre Berge-handling business affairs at irregular intermissions between exploration of a bored genius, and animal cruelty in the form of a pug OD’ing on pills – doesn’t do the film any favors." - Nikola Grozdanovic, The Playlist
Ego Film Arts/The Film Farm
The Captive Atom Egoyan's latest film centers on the kidnapping of a teenage girl, and the torture that her captor puts her parents through. Eight years after Cass (Alexia Fast) disappeared, her parents (Ryan Reynolds and Mireille Enos) discover disturbing new evidence that leads them to believe that she's still alive, and they desperately attempt to get the police to take their case seriously. The film, which was perceived by many to be a comeback vehicle for both Reynolds and Eyogan, premiered to largely negative reviews, putting it up against Grace of Monaco and Lost River for the biggest disappointment of the festival.
"The plotting here is so hopelessly tangled, clichéd, and bereft of psychological complexity that it's difficult to care what happens to any of these people. That goes even for poor Cass, who seems at times to have a touch of Stockholm syndrome but otherwise just looks bored sitting around on the pink princess bed she's outgrown. As Mika's antics become more bizarre and her distraught dad out of nowhere starts outsmarting her tormentors, the movie goes from uninvolving to risible." - David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter
"Any other year, in any other context, The Captive would simply be another overcooked rote thriller that, like so many other films in this genre, totally loses the run of itself in the final act (seriously, Kevin Durand goes so Bond villain that he even has a female henchperson sidekick). [...] Instead, right down to the nearly synonymous title we get a lurid, silly Prisoners me-too (and that film itself was far from flawless) in which the only additions are a flashback-and-forward structure that never works, the kind of contrivance in which a laptop camera accidentally left transmitting records a crucial conversation (perfectly framed) and a crude, distastefully regressive subtheme which suggests that well, of course that this is what happens to girls and to women (even successful, intelligent, independent women) when they are left alone even for a moment by their menfolk." - Jessica Kiang, The Playlist
The Homesman Co-written, directed by and starring Tommy Lee Jones, The Homesman follows a claim jumper and a pioneer woman (Hilary Swank), who accompany three insane women - played by Grace Gummer, Miranda Otto and Sonja Richter - across the border into Iowa. Like several other Cannes contenders, the film has already been receiving awards buzz, thanks to Jones' direction and a powerhouse lead performance from Swank.
"Unlike other actor-directors, Jones never seems to indulge excess on the part of his cast. Though the characters are strong, the performances are understated. Even the three ladies settle into a state of near-catatonia after awhile, rather than indulging their various “hysterias.” In the past, people have whispered about Jones’ attitudes toward women; with this film, he says a thing or two on the subject with a sensitivity that comes as a welcome surprise." - Peter Debruge, Variety
"This is a frontier tale with something of the classic style of Stagecoach or 3:10 to Yuma, but also the consciously grimmer, austerer feel of Kelly Reichardt's Meek's Cutoff and indeed Lee Jones's own The Three Burials Of Melquiades Estrada. And it is a frontier tale which is swimming against the generic current: most stories like these are about heading west. This is about a trudge in the opposite direction." - Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
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Nicole Kidman has shrugged off the storm swirling around her new movie Grace Of Monaco, insisting she has courted controversy throughout her career. The actress' portrayal of Hollywood screen star-turned-princess Grace Kelly has been savaged by critics following its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in France earlier this week (beg12May14).
Film reviewers branded it "dull" and "stiff", while Prince Albert of Monaco and his sisters slammed Kidman's portrayal of their mother, calling the movie a "farce". However, Kidman is refusing to be rattled by the furore, and insists she believed the part was one of the safest role choices of her big screen career.
Speaking to U.K. TV show Good Morning Britain, she says, "Most films I do ruffle feathers. I don't think I've ever done a film that hasn't had some sort of controversy, that just seems to be where I'm at. And even when I think I'm doing something safe, it isn't. "To me this seemed kinda safe but I tend to walk the highwire (sic). If I was in the circus, that would be me, the high wire act."

Country star Keith Urban took a framed picture of his wife Nicole Kidman onto the set of American Idol on Wednesday (14May14) as he was devastated to be missing the premiere of her new movie at the Cannes Film Festival in France. The singer was unable to accompany his partner to the red carpet unveiling of her Grace Kelly biopic Grace of Monaco at the famous movie event due to his filming commitments with the U.S. reality TV show.
However, he kept Kidman in mind throughout the shoot by placing a framed picture of her on the judges' table.
During the show, he told the audience, "My wife is at the Cannes Film Festival tonight and it's heartbreaking I can't be there. This (picture) is her on the red carpet as of tonight, so I'm going to pretend she's here and that I'm there all at the same time. It's the one night I couldn't be there."

Made television debut in the recurring role of Susan, a rookie lifeguard, on the syndicated program "Baywatch"

Appeared as herself on ABC's "Dancing with the Stars"; winner of the competition

Guest-starred on the season finale of ABC's "Spin City"

Had a small role as the Landlady's Daughter in "Mumford"

Originated the role of Samantha 'Sam' McCall on ABC's "General Hospital"; nominated for a Daytime Emmy (2006) for Lead Actress in a Drama Series

Co-hosted the 33rd Daytime Emmy awards (ABC)

Made her Playboy debut as the magazine's Miss April 1997

Summary

When former <I>Playboy</i> model and soap siren Kelly Monaco "shook what her mamma gave her" on the dance floor of TV's summer hit "Dancing with the Stars," she went from respectable but minor-league fame in soap circles to booming overnight fame on a massive scale. Suddenly the 29 year-old actress was everywhere--defending her title on talk shows, giving interviews to papers around the world, glistening on the cover of <I>Maxim.</i> The attention seemed welcomed by the starlet who had been trying to break into the big time for years. Instead of landing that one perfect role, no one--certainly not Monaco herself--would have dreamed winning a celebrity dance-off would do the trick.

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"I love my job; I love being here every day; I love the schedule. It sounds crazy, I know. You don't have a life when you're doing this show, but that keeps me going."---Monaco to SoapOperaDigest, March 18, 2003.